No Supper! (Dinner for us Northerners) August 1-11th 2011

Yes, I am back at it again after not being so strict over the summer and will be continuing to try different diet ideas. Why? Because I gain weight when I don't. So this is my first week back at work before the students arrive and as a teacher, we love to go out to eat for lunch. One problem, I already put on a few pounds this summer while traveling and enjoying libations, so I can't really afford to eat what I want for breakfast, lunch and dinner. So, new diet for 10 days... no dinner! Eat what I want for breakfast and lunch and then don't eat again until the next morning. Now, I will have to admit I ate some popcorn Monday night, so just keep in mind you can have a snack if you are dying of hunger. Just no meals! Alright, most people would hate to skip dinner, but it gives your body a lot of time to digest the food. I also like it because I feel satisfied during the day and it takes the pressure off of worrying about what to eat for breakfast and lunch. I Will let you know how it goes. So far so good!

Here we go! Protein, Protein, No or (low carbs)

Okay, so where have I been? Well, after losing some of my holiday weight, I decided to choose an easy diet plan of 2 weeks of low cal diets. It wasn't too bad, but I didn't lose any additional weight. I actually had some good meals the last couple of weeks and enjoyed my sister's 40th bash!

I am going back to some extreme rules and will be weighing myself more this week. This week is protein, protein, no carbs. What does that mean? It means 2 eggs for breakfast, chicken salad with lettuce for lunch, and chicken with vegetables for dinner. Okay, I just realized that is an overabundance of chickens. I guess it's chicken, chicken when you don't eat mammals.

It has been harder to get to the gym or should I say want to get to the gym since coaching soccer, but I went yesterday and exercised today. As we speak, I am wearing a waist trimmer. This is basically a tight wrap that causes you to sweat thus losing water weight and hypothetically some inches around your waist. We know the protein diets work (well, they work for most people) I am hoping this is the week I get below the 140's for good. Yes, I said it below the 140's. If the contestants of the Biggest Loser can get on the stage and weigh in with no shirt on in front of the world, then I can start saying my weight on here. Wow, what a relief, I feel like inches have been lifted off my waist!

So far on this journey (over a year) I have learned one thing.... not to give up (very profound, I know) because this is a journey that has no end! Even though I take breaks from the gym and take breaks from strict dieting, I have never given up completely. If I would have given up every time I took a break then I would have already been back to where I was last January, and I do not want to be back there again! So I have actually learned something else- take breaks! Take breaks when it comes to dieting, exercising, cleaning, just give your self a break. Enjoy some good foods enjoy your free time, enjoy your family, enjoy your sister's birthday party and drink as much champagne as you want. Wait, where am I going with this? Oh yeah, it is okay to give your self a break, and you will be better because of it.

Okay, so I think it is time to get this waist trimmer off. It has been on double the recommended time and I am starting to get faint.....

The 5 Day Miracle Diet

All of these diets really start to sound the same, but it gives me a plan each week which is a necessity for me.

The inventor of the diet says it takes 5 days to stabilize your blood sugar. The diet involves three main meals as well as three or four small snacks daily.

There are strict rules regarding the timing of meals. I need strict rules or I don't do as well. Breakfast should be eaten within thirty minutes of getting out of bed.Lunch must be eaten before 1 pm and dinner should be eaten no later than 7 pm. This works well for people who like to eat throughout the day. You must eat snacks as often as required between meals so that you never go more than three hours without eating. This means that you will have one or two small snacks between breakfast and lunch as well as one or two snacks in the afternoon.
Breakfast consists of a combination of protein and complex carbohydrate while lunch and dinner includes protein and vegetables. Between meal snacks are low glycemic index fruits and vegetables such as apple, celery and melon.
Foods to avoid: Yogurt, bananas, grapes and bagels. This is a big twist from last week since I was eating grapes, fiber one yogurt and bananas every day.
Recommended foods: Egg whites, chicken breast, turkey, lettuce, cucumber, tomato, peppers, celery, apple, orange, cantaloupe, strawberries.

Here is a sample diet from the book by Andele Puhn:

Breakfast:Scrambled egg whites and oatmeal

Morning snack:Apple

Lunch:Salad with chicken

Afternoon snack:Cantaloupe

Dinner:Turkey and vegetables

The book does not emphasize any exercise, but maybe I will actually throw some in this week since I have not been really good about that part lately.

1200 Calorie Diet

1200 calories! Wow, that feels normal after the last couple of weeks. I actually got sick both weeks following the low calorie diets. Now, I don't know if it was a coincidence or not, but I had the you know whats after the first diet (you know fruit one day, veggies the next.) Then last week, I was throwing up and had a fever after doing low cal/high cal. It could be something I caught or I could have thrown my whole system for a loop. I guess I won't know until I try them again. They both work, results are posted from the prior 2 diets.

So this is as normal of a diet as I have ever done. There is none of the don't eat this, don't eat that. You monitor your caloris by eating low calorie meals. So I can eat three 400 calorie meals a day. There are many websites you can use to count calories. This one is easy and free.
http://www.thecaloriecounter.com/

This diet is known to be a very healthy, but a slow and steady way to lose weight. Well, I know about slow. One year- 15 pounds you could call that slow!
Check in for results next week and let me know what diet you have in mind for me to try (if I didn't already try it last year)

Well, 1200 calories a day is pretty good after the 2 diets prior. I actually felt like I was eating more than usual. Some of the problems I have with this is when you are places where you can't count the calories. I went to bunco and nibbled on some veggies, fruits, and pita chips but you never know exactly what you are eating calorie wise. Saturday morning I got on the scale and was please to see that I had lost a pound this week. So I was at a total loss of 6.5 pounds this month. I say was because Saturday night I had indulged in some pizza and drinks. I would say it was worth it, but I don't know if weight gain is ever worth the taste. Well, maybe sometimes.

Low Cal High Cal

It's a new week- new diet!
I updated my results from the 7 day diet and provided some more information in case you are interested.
This week I will alternate daily between high calorie (1200-1400) and a low calorie (300-400) diet. This diet claims to prevent your body from getting too used to a very low calorie diet. The belief is that your metabolism will continue to work at a normal level since you will be eating higher calories one day and then lower the next. We will see.

Monday- high calorie- it was a snow day so we enjoyed a couple slices of oven baked pizza, oven fries for dinner and some left over chicken wrap.
Tuesday- low calorie and another snow day. Watermelon for breakfast, egg whites and a few left over oven baked fries for lunch, fruit for dinner
Wednesday- high calorie (1200 calories)eggs, chieken salsa, some pasta for dinner
Thursday- low cal again- lots of fruit, starting to feel sick Thursday night. Oh no, throwing up! Here comes the soup!
Friday- This was suppose to be a high cal day, but still felt sick so really didn't eat much.
Over the weekend, I ate one to two meals a day trying to feel better.

All in all this diet caused me to lose weight- DUH! I was so sick, so what do I expect? Not really a fair representation of whether it works or not. I guess I will just have to be happy with the 2 pound loss and start fresh Monday.

I can't say I recommend this diet at this time since I got sick after trying it, but feel free to give it a try and let me know!

7 Day Diet

Happy New Year! Yes, I still have my diets from 2010 in my journal and they will be posted soon. Don't know why I am waiting so long. Just one of those things. I wish I would have started the blog last year, but I didn't so this is better than nothing.
Through all my dieting last year, I was down about 18 pounds in total. The last couple of months I have I not been as strict on my 10 day diets and stopped journaling but was still able to maintain a weight loss of 15 pounds for a few months.
Well, what do you think happened? What happens to many people around the holidays. I put on about 7.5 pounds since Thanksgiving (or should I say since Las Vegas).
Hold on a second. Oh sorry, I was just distracted by Rick asking me how much I think he weighs and wanting to show me his veins and his newly found stomach muscles.
Well, I have to start strict for the new year. Strict or structured is the only thing that works for me. I will be switching my plan this year. I will be doing 6-7 days on a different diet with one day off. The 10 day diets with 4 days off was not strict enough for me, and I would gain too much back in those 4 off days. Now don't get me wrong, it worked but I think I am ready to take on a bigger challenge this year.
I am currently on a 7 day diet. This diet starts with fruit or fruit juice for one day, vegetables the next day, a combination of both for the third day, bananas and skim milk the 4th day, meat and green vegetables for the last 3 days. This has worked so far. I am on the second day and have lost 3.5 pounds. Now I know the weight is not all real weight, but that means the weight I gained over the holidays isn't all real weight either, so either way that is good news to me.
Yes, I am exercising too. Walking with the dogs and will continue weight training. This is a strict diet, but it is what I need to do to get started for my next year of diets.

Results:
I was able to lose 3.5 pounds the first day and kept if off the whole week. I never went any lower than that, and yes I was starving by Thursday, banana day. I don't recommend this diet for anyone unless you go into it knowing you will be hungry and want to drop about 3-4 pounds in a few days. The fruit and vegetable days are not bad because you can eat a variety of fruits and veggies and they can be quite filling. The banana day is not fun. I ate 3 bananas and mixed up the fourth banana with ice and skim milk, but I was still very hungry. I was starving by Friday, but when I ate I found I could not eat very much (due to a shrinking stomach and also due to catching an intestinal bug)So 7 day diet will not be on my list any time soon, but I like the fruit day and will be incorporating this into other diets where possible. Stay tuned for next weeks diet!

Lose Weight or Diet Trying Part 1

It all started after New Years. Isn't this the time it starts for most people? Many pictures are taken and many weight truths come out from the camera. My husband and I are half way through our year long sabbatical of diets. So far he has lost up to 35 pounds and I have lost 16. We have had the occasional person tell us that diets don't work. I know what they mean because I have done enough of them in the past to say they don't work for me because I couldn't stick with one or didn't want to stick with one. That is why this plan is different and works for three main reasons.

Reason Number One, Variety. never getting bored and not feeling stuck to one diet that you know you can't do for eternity. Oh, I can hear it now from all the naturally skinny people or not so skinny people, "Just eat healthy, you don't have to diet." Okay, what does that mean to the normal person that isn't naturally thin? That means you can never order a piece of cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory or enjoy a Margarita from the Mexican Restaurant or order a late night pizza from Dominoes or indulge in a Georgia Mud Pie Blizzard from DQ. Well, with the 10 day diet plans you can still enjoy these things. It is unrealistic to say you will never have these things. It is unrealistic to just say I am going to eat healthy with no parameters or rules set in place to guide your diet. I know because I have said and tried to do that in the past. Eating healthy works until you eat something like chips and salsa and then you feel like you have failed and decide to give up.

Reason Number Two, Find out What Works for You. By doing different diets every ten days; we found out what works best for us. We have found that our bodies respond better to different diets and some diets are much easier for me than they were for my husband and vice versa. My husband and I did the exact same diets and he lost double the weight I did, so I can't be mad or disappointed in myself. I followed the diets and my body responded the way it was meant to respond. We can't control the outcomes; all we can do is follow the diets as closely as possible. This turns the tables for dieters because you will see it as no longer your fault but the diet that is failing them. For example, some people excel at losing weight with Weight Watchers. I have joined weight watchers twice in my life and never saw the results others have seen. Once I joined weight watchers I felt I owed it a three month chance before quitting. It felt like a waste of time and I felt like a failure because no weight losses were made. If you only commit to something for ten days and no losses are made then you will know immediately that this diet is not for you and you can move on to the next one with no feeling of failure on your part. If what you are doing is not working then you will not feel discouraged because you can try something new before you have time to get discouraged.

Reason Number Three, Breaks: Remember when I was talking about eating the cheesecake, well you can on your off days. We incorporated 4 days off after every ten days of dieting. Now, I always gained some weight back in those ten days, so the number of days you want to give yourself will vary on your lifestyle and the speed at which you would want to lose weight. If you are okay with slow weight loss then give yourself three to four days off after every ten day diet. If you want to lose weight faster than you may want to limit your "break" to one or two days.